The second DVD doesn't contain any commentary on the Fifth Symphony. Instead, you see it played straight by the London Symphony Orchestra in 1985, conducted by the composer's son Maxim Shostakovich. You can't help wondering if he's remembering his father's different moods as the work progresses. But as he leaves the podium at the end, beads of sweat gleaming on his brow, it's the sense of authenticity that stays with you. It was a passionate performance, and the man in charge knew what he was doing.
This is not to say that Previn's
rendition with the Royal Philharmonic is less compelling. Both are readings that sooth and thrill by turns, and each can be recommended. The Maxim Shostakovich version, though, is coupled with a performance of the Chamber Symphony conducted by Polish composer Krzysztof Penderecki. This does have an introduction - Penderecki talking in German about his evolving attitudes to Shostakovich. Initially he didn't, as
a patriotic Pole, want anything to do with Russian music. Now he considers Shostakovich to have written the 20th century's finest chamber works, and his output in general to be "fabulous." The Chamber Symphony (an arrange-ment of one of Shostakovich's string quartets) is performed by the Sinfonietta Cracovia in the Alte Oper, Frankfurt, in a 1994 production.
Both these discs show that great music doesn't lose by being heard, and seen, in an old recording. But another product, Deutsche Grammophon's Wien Nach Noten (Vienna in Music) from 1973 now does feel woefully dated. Some people may detect a period charm here, but for my part I don't see how, with its kitsch pastry-cooks and sweetly smiling flaxen maidens, it could ever have been considered very compelling. DGM would have been well advised to give this one a miss from this year's re-issue list.
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